Platforms 2014 (2018 update)

I thought to start a new "platforms" thread, and use this post to regularly update the platform suggestions list, so Andrea will not have to skim through many posts to know which platform should be added / deleted / modified.

Feel free to edit it yourself to add / delete suggestions. I think the discussion about why / how to add / delete / modify these entries should be done as a reply to this thread, and this post should link to the post in which it is discussed.

Sanguine: Windows Phone 8 needs its own platform as it is no longer WinCE based as Windows Phone 7 and earlier were.
Zerothis: Agreed, WindowsCE and Windows Phone 8 may not be as incredibly different as Mac Classic and Mac OS X, but they are at least as different as UNIX and Linux. As such it needs to be a separate platform.
Sanguine: Windows Phone 8 is actually closer to the desktop version of Windows 8 than WinCE, except it's ARM based (Qualcomm Snapdragon) rather than x86.

dandyboh: Interact Home Computer, by Interact Co. of Ann Arbor MI., 1979, later rebranded as "Victor Lambda I" by company "Lambda System" for the French market. Uses an Intel 8080A running at 2Mhz. It has a RAM of 16 KB and a ROM of 2 KB.
Zerothis: The operating system is in BIOS with essential elements (to actually doing anything productive) expected to occur on the cassette (like with a bootloader disk). The OS apparently has no name simple being "The Interact Home Computer BIOS". It was developed for the original Interact Home Computer by Jack Unger. Someone could ask him for more details, he's on Linkedin.

leszy: Galaksija, Yugoslavia
I have found this lovely page which lists games for the Galaksija, Pecom and Orao. It is in Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian (whatever you like to call it) but even without knowledge of the language it's easy to navigate.

leszy: EI NIS Pecom 32/64, Yugoslavia
I have found this lovely page which lists games for the Galaksija, Pecom and Orao. It is in Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian (whatever you like to call it) but even without knowledge of the language it's easy to navigate.

leszy: PEL Varaždin Orao, Yugoslavia
I have found this lovely page which lists games for the Galaksija, Pecom and Orao. It is in Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian (whatever you like to call it) but even without knowledge of the language it's easy to navigate.

diedel: What about the MSX2+ and the MSX Turbo-R systems?
Ok, there are not many games but some of them are very popular.

MSX2+:
F1 Spirit 3D Special
Laydock 2

MSX Turbo-R:
Illusion City
Fray

List of exclusive MSX2+ gamesList of exclusive MSX Turbo-R gamesteran01: Could be done with tags, could be done with seperate platforms. This problem is similar to my "Sharp X1" question I had. As long as there is no new platform I suggest to enter the games under MSX2 and tag them.
teran01: Regarding MSX I think they can be considered different platforms. They all represented a whole new generation of MSX with different minimum system specs retaining most of backwards compatability. I think of MSX -> MSX2 and so on like Amiga OCS -> Amiga AGA. So they were a real step forward not just some extra RAM like Atari 520ST -> 1040ST or Amiga 500 -> Amiga 2000.

dandyboh: VideoBrain Family Computer, from Umtech, first introduced in December 1977 and first sold in March 1978. 6 games + 5 educational software are known to exist for it. First computer with a cartridge port.

dandyboh: CompuColor 8001 and CompuColor II, released in December 1976 and 1977, by CompuColor Corporation, are considered as the first color computers. A great website is dedicated to the CompuColor II, containing an ActionScript emulator of the computer and many informations about the computer and games released for it.

teran01: I request to remove the Odyssey 200 and other super old "consoles" that had only built in game-variants (mostly pong variants). Maybe even remove the original Odyssey. We could add a new platform which comprises all these different consoles and even similar electronic handheld devices like the Game&Watch games.
dandyboh: I agree with this. The Odyssey 200 just has built-in games, it is not a real console like Odyssey 2 or Odyssey 3.

leszy: Maybe the platform KC85 should be renamed to KC85/2-4 (there were three models: KC85/2, KC85/3 and KC85/4, HC900 is another name for the KC85/2). There are two series of computers from the German Democratic Republic that go by the name KC85, there is also the KC85/1 (=KC87), so just KC85 is a bit ambiguous. There is no compatibility between the two series. The KC85 on UVL should be the KC85/2-4.

Also R.F.T. is listed as the developer of the KC85 (KC85/2-4). It should be Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen (or if that name is not long enough for you VEB Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen or VEB Mikroelektronik „Wilhelm Pieck" Mühlhausen). Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen was part of the VEB Kombinat Mikroelektronik „Karl Marx" Erfurt, but the developer should be Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen, I think.

The KC85/1 on the other hand was produced by VEB Robotron-Meßelektronik „Otto Schön" Dresden, part of the VEB Kombinat Robotron.

These systems are not all compatible because of the shapes of the cartridges, but they are software-compatibles. It seems unclear if Interton built their system from scratch or bought the technology from another company.

So: what I want to bring up here is that I think we should add every game of these numerous platforms to a single platform (NB: I think this is already done). Should it be VC-4000 or 1292 APVS ? It may be 1292 APVS as it was the first one released ; or VC-4000 as it was the first one produced ; or MPU-1000 as it is the most famous and most sold of all these systems. But whatever we choose, I think we should choose the release date of 1976, and it seems strange to me not to choose 1292 APVS, the only one released in 1976, in this case.

dandyboh: Apple IIe platform seems to includes games from all the Apple II computers family (Apple I, Apple II, Apple IIe, Apple IIc - but not Apple IIGS which have its own platform). The 1976 release date indicated tend to prove it (Apple I was released in 1976, Apple II in 1977, Apple IIe in 1983). So maybe we should rename it to "Apple II" or "Apple II series"?
Or maybe we could switch "Apple IIe" platform to all the Apple computers above, but that would be a huge work.
zerothis: Apple I/II series
Or just
Apple II series
Seems reasonably ok to cover everything except ][gs EDIT: and except Apple ///

teran01: Question about the Sharp X1 series. From my understanding there are three major releases in the Sharp X1 series.

Sharp X1
Sharp X1 Turbo
Sharp X1 Turbo Z

In UVL we have Sharp X1 and Sharp X1 Turbo Z as platform. How should I enter "Sharp X1 Turbo" games? What makes the most sense regarding this platform.
a) Only have one single platform Sharp X1 and tag for "turbo" and "turbojavascript:void(0);z" games?
b) Three separate platforms?
c) Renaming platform "Sharp X1 Turbo Z" to "Sharp X1 Turbo" to inlude both "Z" and non-Z Turbo games?

I tend to c) because it seems that ROM collections differentiate between these two platforms, but don't have special Turbo Z collections.
teran 01: Now what about the Sharp X series? I do not know how it was done there. For me the main question is: How much do the games overlap here? Are there instances when the same game was published in a Sharp X1 version and a Sharp X1 Turbo (Z) version and how did they do it? Did they came on one and the same disk sharing the code and the system would recognise if it was a Sharp X1 Turbo and would display more colors for example? Or did they came in different game boxes marketed especially towards one range of Sharp X1 computer? In the second case and in the case that there is actually no overlapping of games between the systems I am for separate platforms, because we have a clear line and definition here when a game belongs to which platform. If there is overlapping and you have cases where you have one single game and you have to decide under which platform to put it (or both) then I would say merging of platforms makes sense. Similar as we have it for Atari 8-bit or C16/Plus4.

leszy: *ZPA IQ 151, Czechoslovakia
the only thing I could find are very simple games from a czechoslovakian textbrook from 1987 that I found online. Here is the link in case someone is interested, games are on p. 161-197. I don't feel like typing them in.
So maybe that one should be a bit lower on the priority list.

The other systems that I proposed are still worth adding in my opinion. None of them are clones of other systems. The page that I linked above is actually very trustworthy it seems, so if they don't mention that a home computer is a clone, then it probably isn't.

I have to correct myself about the name:
The manufacturer of the Pecom32/64 is written EI Niš or Ei Niš (probably the "i" should be upper-case, though the company's logo has a lower-case i). EI/Ei is short for Elektronska Industrija, but it's definitely "Niš" (that's the city where the company is located), not "NIS".

Also, clones:
The PMD 85 has the following versions: PMD 85, 85-1, 85-2, 85-2A, 85-3, Mato.
Didaktik Alfa/Beta are clones of the PMD 85 and the Consul 2717 is a clone of the PMD 85-2.

I will look into other systems that seem worth adding later. I think it will be enough work to add games for the systems that I proposed already.
There is so much more that could be added. Maybe even printers ;-)

dandyboh: Amstrad PCW, by Amstrad (UK), released in September 1985, dedicated word processing computer (PCW stands for Personal Computer Wordprocessor) but several games were released on it.
CPU Zilog Z80 A running at 4 MHz (but is slowed down by the internal clock to 3,4 Mhz), 256 KB RAM (16 banks of 16 kb each), text mode 90 x 32, graphic mode 720 x 256 (PAL), 720 x 200 (NTSC), monochrome (black & green), OS : CP/M, CP/M+.
teran01: Mobygames added Amstrad PCW just recently to their list of platforms. A good indicator that its a valid candidate to add. Personally I don't know much about it. Only read some bits here and there in old Amstrad specific magazines when adding reviews from those mags.
zerothis: We could tag CPM or BASIC and have an Amstrad PCW platform.
His presents an issue for CP/M games for IBM-PC and clones. As we have no IBM-PC and clones platforms. For IBM-PC we have operating systems as platforms. It would not be very intuitive to tag, say, MS-DOS games as CP/M. For this we could add an IBM-PC-CP/M platform.

We could have a CP/M platform. This covers CP/M but not so much BASIC for Amstrad PCW. And the actual systems(s) it runs on would need to be tagged. This would lead to oddities such as tagging "Apple2", "Commodore 128", "Commodore 64", "Atari 8-bit"

I think I have a third choice, which is even worse is some ways but solves a lot. And we are currently using parts of this solution already.

Join _all_ OS-Platform occurrences into their host machine. There is but one "IBM and clones" (Intel PC Architecture) platform, and tag all operating systems. But elevate selected container groups (OS Tags) so that they can appear and be counted in UVL as platforms. And finally, ensure that these selected container groups are properly counted or not counted (depending on context) when used across multiple platforms OS/2-x86, OS/2-PPC, CP/M-IBM, CP/M-PCW, CP/M-C128, CP/M-TRS80, and so on. IBM and clones would actually appear as multiple platforms depending on context. The oft ignored 'PC Booters', is covered by this also. This also solves the Linux is not UNIX and the non-UNIX/Linux games currently in the Linux platform. (obsolete issue)

Ah, I was wondering about this:

Programs written for CP/M were typically portable between different machines, usually only requiring specification of the escape sequences for control of the screen and printer. This portability made CP/M popular, and much more software was written for CP/M than for operating systems that only ran on one brand of hardware. One restriction on portability was that certain programs used the extended instruction set of the Z80 processor and would not operate on an 8080 or 8085 processor.

So in theory, its like modern java. However, I wonder if, in practice, game authors often used CPU specific or even platform specific code in their games, or like with modern java, took perfectly cross-platform games and wrapped then in OS-dependent containers, in such a way that the 'CP/M application' effectively became OS specific?

escape sequences for control of the screen and printer.

I remember both DOS and Apple applications that asked me to correctly specify details like this before they would function properly. I think this need not count towards platform compatibility. That said, I will also note that I have never used CP/M in life, virtual life, or emulated life.

Quoted from dandyboh:Recently, I wandered if it would be better to add CP/M platform instead of PCW, as Zerothis suggested years ago... but I disagree with that: most CPC games ran on Basic but a few ones ran on CP/M ; most PCW games run on CP/M but a few ones ran on Basic, so... maybe the better solution would simply be to add CP/M tag to games which run on CP/M (instead of removing all CPC / CP/M games from the CPC platform and transfer them to the new CP/M platform).
[...]
If we create a CP/M platform, what should we do with games which are Amstrad CPC / CP/M or IBM PC / CP/M?

Quoted from zerothis:We could tag CPM or BASIC and have an Amstrad PCW platform.
His presents an issue for CP/M games for IBM-PC and clones. As we have no IBM-PC and clones platforms. For IBM-PC we have operating systems as platforms. It would not be very intuitive to tag, say, MS-DOS games as CP/M. For this we could add an IBM-PC-CP/M platform.

We could have a CP/M platform. This covers CP/M but not so much BASIC for Amstrad PCW. And the actual systems(s) it runs on would need to be tagged. This would lead to oddities such as tagging "Apple2", "Commodore 128", "Commodore 64", "Atari 8-bit"

Any other choices?

To include CP/M properly, we would need to include this list of platforms in some way (over 200). Many systems on this list can run other OSes besides CP/M by default or installed later. And, MSX machines can also run CP/M

Quoted from dandyboh:I prefer the first one, as I think we should give priority to "platform = machine" rather than "platform = OS" when it is possible. This may not be a great solution BTW, but I can't find another for now.

There is a number of Eastern European home computer systems that are not yet included. I'll admit that I'm not at all knowledgeable about this subject, so I can't say which of them are worth adding. Certainly not all, since some are just clones of other systems, but here are some suggestions that to me seem noteworthy (the list is not meant to be exhaustive in any way):

There is a number of Eastern European home computer systems that are not yet included. I'll admit that I'm not at all knowledgeable about this subject, so I can't say which of them are worth adding. Certainly not all, since some are just clones of other systems, but here are some suggestions that to me seem noteworthy (the list is not meant to be exhaustive in any way):

So...what do you think? Maybe someone knows a bit more about them?
Btw, here's a nice page about Eastern European home computers.

I would rather have a list of games for one of these systems before entering them. And yes I think all of these platforms have some games. Non-commercial, not well known hobbiest ones I think. A platform that stays with 0 games for a long time looks out of place. So if someone enters a bunch of games after adding a fresh platform I'm all for it.

Besides that I don't know the systems myself and thus cannot say which of them is a clone or a platform on its own. Needs some research.

I would rather have a list of games for one of these systems before entering them. And yes I think all of these platforms have some games. Non-commercial, not well known hobbiest ones I think. A platform that stays with 0 games for a long time looks out of place. So if someone enters a bunch of games after adding a fresh platform I'm all for it.

Besides that I don't know the systems myself and thus cannot say which of them is a clone or a platform on its own. Needs some research.

Certainly, whether there are actually any games for the system is something that must be considered.

I have found this lovely page which lists games for the Galaksija, Pecom and Orao. It is in Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian (whatever you like to call it) but even without knowledge of the language it's easy to navigate.

Some software, mostly games, for the PMD 85 can be found here (Slovak).

About the IQ 151 I'm not so sure anymore, seems to be more difficult to find information at least.

Could be done with tags, could be done with seperate platforms. This problem is similar to my "Sharp X1" question I had. As long as there is no new platform I suggest to enter the games under MSX2 and tag them.

And its not only Sharp and MSX, but the other Japanese computers as well. From Fujitsu we have the FM-7 (in UVL) and FM-77 (not in UVL. FM-77 seems downwards compatible to FM-7, but I am not sure how much it can be considered its own platform. Maybe similar to what the Atari STE is to the Atari ST. Sometimes it seems to be better I think to subsume a group a machines under one name like Atari 8-bit for the whole range of early Atari computers.

Big update on the first post, now you can directly check propositions and discussions by clicking on "spoiler", or go to the original post by clicking on the system name.

I also updated with recent propositions.

About Sharp X1 and MSX, I'm not familiar with these platforms but I think we can handle these as tags. For now, at least. I tend to agree with teran01: the Atari 8-bit entry lists Atari 400/800/600XL/800XL/1200XL/65XE/130XE/1020/XEGS - which don't need to have their own entry as they're basically the same family of systems. Same for Thomson MO5/MO6/TO7/TO7-70/TO8/TO9/TO9+/TO16. Plus, it is also difficult to know if a game is compatible with a specific model; games can be compatible on several models; so it is much easier to mark the game as a "Atari 8-bit game" or "Thomson game", and use tags if we know which system is compatible with the game.
It may not be the exact same thing for Sharp X1 and MSX, but I think it is a good solution, unless someone come here with a good reason to say that platform_name_here needs to have its own entry.

What is the problem of adding new platforms? At least for completion purposes it would be nice to add all the existing platforms. And it's nice to have the platform entry with its own article and photo :)

By the way, the C128 platform adds only more speed and memory to the C64 platform and it has few exclusive games, should not be out too?

Raspberry Pi maybe? There's a port of Minecraft for it at least. Tho custom platform is probably better for that than actual platform entry, or just Unix/Linux as there's Debian based Linux for it that's needed by that Minecraft at least.

What is the problem of adding new platforms? At least for completion purposes it would be nice to add all the existing platforms. And it's nice to have the platform entry with its own article and photo :)

By the way, the C128 platform adds only more speed and memory to the C64 platform and it has few exclusive games, should not be out too?

Adding new platforms is not a problem. The problem, in my opinion, is about adding a new platform which is compatible with another platform already registered in the database. For example, we just have Atari ST instead of Atari 520ST and Atari 1040ST because most games can run on both machines. Having separated platform would force us to duplicate identical games.

As I said before, I'm not familiar with MSX2+ / MSX Turbo-R or Sharp X1 Turbo / Sharp X1 Turbo Z, so maybe we need to have them as separate platform, I do not know.

Regarding MSX I think they can be considered different platforms. They all represented a whole new generation of MSX with different minimum system specs retaining most of backwards compatability. I think of MSX -> MSX2 and so on like Amiga OCS -> Amiga AGA. So they were a real step forward not just some extra RAM like Atari 520ST -> 1040ST or Amiga 500 -> Amiga 2000.

If you look at all the MSX1 models you will recognize how diverse they were. MSX was a standard, but the hardware producers all made different models, some cheaper with less RAM, some with more RAM and many extras. The same applies to MSX2 and so on. The standard just made sure that the machines were compatible with each other. I think the problem lies in the naming of MSX2+ which sounds like a little upgrade of an MSX2. Well it seems that the jump from MSX2 to MSX2+ and later the MSX Turbo was indeed not as big, but there were exclusive games for all these machines. The games for MSX1 and MSX2 were always marketed differently. They did not use the same code. A game like 1942 for MSX1 and MSX2 were two completely different ports. Its not the same code that would recognize an MSX2 and would thus run with more colors. For these instances it is very good to decide to have two different platforms. You can pretty much always say whether it is clearly an MSX1 or MSX2 etc. game.

Now what about the Sharp X series? I do not know how it was done there. For me the main question is: How much do the games overlap here? Are there instances when the same game was published in a Sharp X1 version and a Sharp X1 Turbo (Z) version and how did they do it? Did they came on one and the same disk sharing the code and the system would recognise if it was a Sharp X1 Turbo and would display more colors for example? Or did they came in different game boxes marketed especially towards one range of Sharp X1 computer? In the second case and in the case that there is actually no overlapping of games between the systems I am for separate platforms, because we have a clear line and definition here when a game belongs to which platform. If there is overlapping and you have cases where you have one single game and you have to decide under which platform to put it (or both) then I would say merging of platforms makes sense. Similar as we have it for Atari 8-bit or C16/Plus4.

On top of all of that overlap issues, we also have long standing practice of including various ~enhanced tags (HP 48GX, Super Gameyboy 2, Coco 3, CPC+, Spectrum 128K, Super Gameboy) which exist to reduce duplicate games despite some differences. So are those Sharp X games exactly the same, totally different, or just same game that runs in slightly altered form on the other platform?

I would like to start adding games to Amstrad PCW platform (~210-220 games).

Recently, I wandered if it would be better to add CP/M platform instead of PCW, as Zerothis suggested years ago... but I disagree with that: most CPC games ran on Basic but a few ones ran on CP/M ; most PCW games run on CP/M but a few ones ran on Basic, so... maybe the better solution would simply be to add CP/M tag to games which run on CP/M (instead of removing all CPC / CP/M games from the CPC platform and transfer them to the new CP/M platform).

I would like to start adding games to Amstrad PCW platform (~210-220 games).

Mobygames added Amstrad PCW just recently to their list of platforms. A good indicator that its a valid candidate to add. Personally I don't know much about it. Only read some bits here and there in old Amstrad specific magazines when adding reviews from those mags.

I would like to start adding games to Amstrad PCW platform (~210-220 games).

Mobygames

There you've gone and said the M word :) Seriously though. On the one hand they are pretty strict on what they add. I'm sure there was quite a debate about it. One the otherhand, they often list classify platforms in a completely different way than we do.

I'd like to see the debate they had.

Till then
Can you transfer most any PCW C/PM game to say an IBM 8086 system run it without hacks?
Can you transfer most any PCW BASIC game to say an IBM 8086 system run it without hacks? Now those same questions for a 68k platform?

Can you transfer most any PCW C/PM game to say an IBM 8086 system run it without hacks?
Can you transfer most any PCW BASIC game to say an IBM 8086 system run it without hacks? Now those same questions for a 68k platform?

I don't think so but I really don't know all of that. I only know that Amstrad released soon after a range of Amstrad PC, and games for it were IBM-DOS compatibles.

I know that some PCW games could also run on a CPC but I think it was more something like PCW version on a side of the disk, CPC version on the other side.

I also know that a software existed, called WYSIWYG 1.0, to be installed on both MS-DOS PC and CP/M PCW computers, to transfer data from one machine to another.

This may not help. But what is the PCW architecture? If it's x86, and the PCW is a PC clone, then it's DOS and as-of-yet-not-included CP/M. Note, the IBM-PC (and clones) were DOS or CP/M as well. It's just CP/M for IBM-PC sold so incredibly poorly this fact is forgotten.
CP/M came in Z80 and 68k versions also.

Yes, I believe I saw on a webpage years ago, someone had collected 75 applications designed to transfer files from system whatever or OS whatever to CP/M

About the IQ 151:
the only thing I could find are very simple games from a czechoslovakian textbrook from 1987 that I found online. Here is the link in case someone is interested, games are on p. 161-197. I don't feel like typing them in.
So maybe that one should be a bit lower on the priority list.

The other systems that I proposed are still worth adding in my opinion. None of them are clones of other systems. The page that I linked above is actually very trustworthy it seems, so if they don't mention that a home computer is a clone, then it probably isn't.

I have to correct myself about the name:
The manufacturer of the Pecom32/64 is written EI Niš or Ei Niš (probably the "i" should be upper-case, though the company's logo has a lower-case i). EI/Ei is short for Elektronska Industrija, but it's definitely "Niš" (that's the city where the company is located), not "NIS".

Also, clones:
The PMD 85 has the following versions: PMD 85, 85-1, 85-2, 85-2A, 85-3, Mato.
Didaktik Alfa/Beta are clones of the PMD 85 and the Consul 2717 is a clone of the PMD 85-2.

I will look into other systems that seem worth adding later. I think it will be enough work to add games for the systems that I proposed already.
There is so much more that could be added. Maybe even printers ;-)

KC85:
Maybe the platform KC85 should be renamed to KC85/2-4 (there were three models: KC85/2, KC85/3 and KC85/4, HC900 is another name for the KC85/2). There are two series of computers from the German Democratic Republic that go by the name KC85, there is also the KC85/1 (=KC87), so just KC85 is a bit ambiguous. There is no compatibility between the two series. The KC85 on UVL should be the KC85/2-4.

Also R.F.T. is listed as the developer of the KC85 (KC85/2-4). It should be Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen (or if that name is not long enough for you VEB Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen or VEB Mikroelektronik „Wilhelm Pieck" Mühlhausen). Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen was part of the VEB Kombinat Mikroelektronik „Karl Marx" Erfurt, but the developer should be Mikroelektronik Mühlhausen, I think.

The KC85/1 on the other hand was produced by VEB Robotron-Meßelektronik „Otto Schön" Dresden, part of the VEB Kombinat Robotron.

This may not help. But what is the PCW architecture? If it's x86, and the PCW is a PC clone, then it's DOS and as-of-yet-not-included CP/M. Note, the IBM-PC (and clones) were DOS or CP/M as well. It's just CP/M for IBM-PC sold so incredibly poorly this fact is forgotten.
CP/M came in Z80 and 68k versions also.

Amstrad did produce PC clone and called it Amstrad PC. Amstrad PCW are Z80 CP/M, and CP/M was included.

I'm not sure if it deserves its own platform as I'm not very familiar with this. But if it does not, I'd like to know which platform should be used for these games in your opinion. If we create a CP/M platform, what should we do with games which are Amstrad CPC / CP/M or IBM PC / CP/M?

We could tag CPM or BASIC and have an Amstrad PCW platform.
His presents an issue for CP/M games for IBM-PC and clones. As we have no IBM-PC and clones platforms. For IBM-PC we have operating systems as platforms. It would not be very intuitive to tag, say, MS-DOS games as CP/M. For this we could add an IBM-PC-CP/M platform.

We could have a CP/M platform. This covers CP/M but not so much BASIC for Amstrad PCW. And the actual systems(s) it runs on would need to be tagged. This would lead to oddities such as tagging "Apple2", "Commodore 128", "Commodore 64", "Atari 8-bit"

Any other choices?

To include CP/M properly, we would need to include this list of platforms in some way (over 200). Many systems on this list can run other OSes besides CP/M by default or installed later. And, MSX machines can also run CP/M

These systems are not all compatible because of the shapes of the cartridges, but they are software-compatibles. It seems unclear if Interton built their system from scratch or bought the technology from another company.

So: what I want to bring up here is that I think we should add every game of these numerous platforms to a single platform (NB: I think this is already done). Should it be VC-4000 or 1292 APVS ? It may be 1292 APVS as it was the first one released ; or VC-4000 as it was the first one produced ; or MPU-1000 as it is the most famous and most sold of all these systems. But whatever we choose, I think we should choose the release date of 1976, and it seems strange to me not to choose 1292 APVS, the only one released in 1976, in this case.

Apple IIe platform seems to includes games from all the Apple II computers family (Apple I, Apple II, Apple IIe, Apple IIc - but not Apple IIGS which have its own platform). The 1976 release date indicated tend to prove it (Apple I was released in 1976, Apple II in 1977, Apple IIe in 1983). So maybe we should rename it to "Apple II" or "Apple II series"?
Or maybe we could switch "Apple IIe" platform to all the Apple computers above, but that would be a huge work.

------

I also found new computers:
VideoBrain Family Computer, from Umtech, first introduced in December 1977 and first sold in March 1978. 6 games + 5 educational software are known to exist for it. First computer with a cartridge port.

CompuColor 8001 and CompuColor II, released in December 1976 and 1977, by CompuColor Corporation, are considered as the first color computers. A great website is dedicated to the CompuColor II, containing an ActionScript emulator of the computer and many informations about the computer and games released for it.

We could tag CPM or BASIC and have an Amstrad PCW platform.
His presents an issue for CP/M games for IBM-PC and clones. As we have no IBM-PC and clones platforms. For IBM-PC we have operating systems as platforms. It would not be very intuitive to tag, say, MS-DOS games as CP/M. For this we could add an IBM-PC-CP/M platform.

We could have a CP/M platform. This covers CP/M but not so much BASIC for Amstrad PCW. And the actual systems(s) it runs on would need to be tagged. This would lead to oddities such as tagging "Apple2", "Commodore 128", "Commodore 64", "Atari 8-bit"

Any other choices?

Not really. I prefer the first one, as I think we should give priority to "platform = machine" rather than "platform = OS" when it is possible. This may not be a great solution BTW, but I can't find another for now.

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Another early computer I found:
Exidy Sorcerer, by Exidy (USA) in 1978. Sold in Europe in 1979 by Liveport Ltd (UK) and CompuData (Netherlands). CPU Zilog Z80, 4k RAM expandable to 48, 4k ROM, display 64x30, monochrome screen, no sound. ~6 or 7 games are known to exist, mainly clones of arcade hits (Space Invaders, Galaxian, Pac-Man, Breakout, ...).

I think I have a third choice, which is even worse is some ways but solves a lot. And we are currently using parts of this solution already.

Join _all_ OS-Platform occurrences into their host machine. There is but one "IBM and clones" (Intel PC Architecture) platform, and tag all operating systems. But elevate selected container groups (OS Tags) so that they can appear and be counted in UVL as platforms. And finally, ensure that these selected container groups are properly counted or not counted (depending on context) when used across multiple platforms OS/2-x86, OS/2-PPC, CP/M-IBM, CP/M-PCW, CP/M-C128, CP/M-TRS80, and so on. IBM and clones would actually appear as multiple platforms depending on context. The oft ignored 'PC Booters', is covered by this also. This also solves the Linux is not UNIX and the non-UNIX/Linux games currently in the Linux platform.

Ah, I was wondering about this:

Programs written for CP/M were typically portable between different machines, usually only requiring specification of the escape sequences for control of the screen and printer. This portability made CP/M popular, and much more software was written for CP/M than for operating systems that only ran on one brand of hardware. One restriction on portability was that certain programs used the extended instruction set of the Z80 processor and would not operate on an 8080 or 8085 processor.

So in theory, its like modern java. However, I wonder if, in practice, game authors often used CPU specific or even platform specific code in their games, or like with modern java, took perfectly cross-platform games and wrapped then in OS-dependent containers, in such a way that the 'CP/M application' effectively became OS specific?

escape sequences for control of the screen and printer.

I remember both DOS and Apple applications that asked me to correctly specify details like this before they would function properly. I think this need not count towards platform compatibility. That said, I will also note that I have never used CP/M in life, virtual life, or emulated life.

However, I wonder if, in practice, game authors often used CPU specific or even platform specific code in their games

Assembly optimization is probably still a thing, at least for the high end engines like Unreal, id Tech, and probably Unity as well. And this is also where some more interesting CPU requirements come from (though usually they try to set the requirement to some decent baseline that has wide user base, covering both certain generation AMD and Intel CPUs instead of being limited to just one or the other). Probably closer to compiler shorthands for ASM than pure use of it. This is also where comes the ability of x86 CPUs ability to actually report what they're capable of.

Though I guess modern compilers are smart enough about things to remove that need and profiled compilations probably make it even less needed.

A few notable examples spring to mind. Rollercoaster Tycoon has a miniscule set of code for DirectX overhead and everything else is highly optimized assembly. It unusually experienced high sales without the expected ports to 'everything'. Clearly the assembly code was the barrier to this.

ZSNES is highly optimized 32-bit assembly as well. In this case, it is so specific as to run slower on 64-bit machines and no one has yet made a practical 64-bit build. Canonical's repository volunteers will not add it to 64-bit repositories with 32-bit dependencies (like they do with most other 32-bit dependents). The project lead recommends users setup a 32-bit chroot environment.

After thinking a bit about the "unlocking content" relation, I came to the conclusion that the Sony PocketStation and the Sega VMU would also be worth adding. Both are peripherals for other consoles, namely for PlayStation and Dreamcast respectively, but both also work as handheld consoles. Several PlayStation/DC games came with games that could be loaded onto the peripheral and played in order to unlock content in the main game, but the PocketStation even has some "independent" (non-homebrew) games it appears.
There are also homebrew games for both systems, I think the VMU has more.

The PocketStation/VMU games had games specifically for them. Only those games typically (always?) came with PS1/DC games. But that should not be a reason not to add them.

I'll give an example. Final Fantasy VIII came with Chocobo World (CW). Players of the PC version might be familiar with that game as this version also contained a port of CW (and on the PC it could be very easily exploited to get tons of rare and useful items). However, originally this was a PocketStation game.
CW could be described as a very simple RPG: you control Boko, a Chocobo (a Chicobo actually), and steer him
on a map onto certain events. Events can be battles, meeting Cactuar who gives Boko items that can be transferred to FF8, meeting Moomba who will give you a new weapon and other special events depending on your level. If you want to learn more, please read the article on the Final Fantasy Wiki. The point is, it is a totally different game from Final Fantasy VIII which is running on a different system.

But I agree that there should also be PocketStation and VMU tags for games that support those peripherals. It would make it possible to search for such games (which a relation would not). Besides the VMU is sometimes supported by DC games that do not come with a VMU game but use it for second screen functionality.

Amstrad NC100 Notepad (and successor Amstrad NC200 Notebook) are portable computers by Amstrad in 1992 and 1993. NC200 included three Tetris-like games built-in (I will enter games for these platform under the "custom" platform for now, with Amstrad NC100 and Amstrad NC200 tags).

MinuetOS is now at version 1.0
It has 9 games currently including Doom and Quake. Runs DOSBox and SCUMMVM.
MinuetOS is an original OS written in assembley, not related to any other OS, is GUI base, includes all neccissary hardware drivers, is under 1.44 MB in size, requires only 90z Pentium, and 32 MB RAM. Fully boots in 5 seconds. Version including Doom, Quake, DOSBox, and SCUMMVM requires a CD (more than 1.44 MB). 32-bit MinuetOS is GPLv2, 64-bit MinuetOS is proprietary with binaries freely redistributable.

At the moment we have only the "Epoch Cassette Vision" as platform. Shouldn't the "Super Cassette Vision" get its own entry as well? Actually most of the games listed for the Cassette Vision are actually Super Cassette Vision games.

I've delved into some Japanese websites with Epoch Cassette Vision info and gleaned this (hopefully not losing too much in translation). Yes, these are different.

The Super Cassette Vision (and the Lady Cassette Vision) are 'modern' systems (more advanced than an Atari 2600) where as the Original Cassette Vision (and Cassette Vision Jr.) are some where between a TV pong-like and Atari VCS. Similar to an Odyssey 100 but slightly more advanced. There is no traditional "RAM" or "CPU" in the ECV. There are three TTL units (Transistor-Transistor Logic), A CD4049, CD4050, and uPDC626C and memory of some sort happens on the board. But ECV games based only on the ECV hardware would not be much more advanced than an Odyssey 100 or TV pong-like (they'd look the same but have a few more features than a TV pong-like). The game cartridges themselves contain 12-bit ROM+CPU chips (both in one); either a uPD778C or custom uPD777C (the 'custom' part is information in the ROM of the chip. i.e. the game). The CPU parts of the chips are apparently underutilized as image processors. So the effect is a TV pong-like game with complex shapes and multi-color sprites, such as a red race car (shaped like a race car) with black wheels a driver in the cockpit. Interestingly, the main board hardware can accept 48-bit instructions and data, I wonder if there were thoughts of making 2 or 4 chip games (these could have been as complex as many Atari VCS games)? Most games only use 4-bit instructions and data, one uses 8-bit.

The original Matra Alice was a straight TRS-80 clone developed in cooperation with Tandy
The followup computers
Matra Alice 32and
Matra Alice 90Were also based on Tandy computers but contained customer chips and hardware meaning many Alice 32/90 games will not run on Tandy computers. Also, they use SCART and French TV signals, so again, not on Tandy.

I was thinking of using a CamputersLynx tag and putting the games into the Commodore 128 platform simply because it is so dissimilar to anything but comparable to (yet more advanced) than a C 128. I estimate there are currently 50 games for it.

Platform suggestion 1: I think real Bada (Wave) should be it's own platform.
Platform suggestion 2: Tizen should be it's own platform with tags for forks (Sailfish, River Trail, etc).

Samsung Linux was an early effort by Samsung to make their own Linux based OS for mobile and other devices. No known games.

Samsung LiMo / LiMo Linux / EFL project was another effort by Samsung to make their own Linux based OS for mobile and other devices. EFL project became LiMo. LiMo actual became the Tizen project. No known games.

Samsung Bada / Samsung Wave was a more successful (and non-Linux) effort (they actual released some devices that used Bada and Wave) by Samsung to make their own smart phone OS for mobile and other devices. They considered making it open source but eventually chose to end further development but merged Bada into Tizen (so, it did kinda become open source.) There merging efforts included incentives for Bada devs to port fully to Tizen At least 50 games.Anything named "Bada" after 2014 is actually Tizen.

Samsung Tizen / Intel Tizen / Tizen Linux / Linux Foundation Tizen is a project within the Linux Foundation with support from Samsung, Intel, Huawei, Fujitsu, NEC, Panasonic, KT Corporation, Sprint Corporation, Sprint Nextel, SK Telecom, Orange, NTT DoCoMo, Vodafone, Automotive Grade Linux Workgroup. Tizen devices use X Windows, Wayland, Dalvik (runs android apps), Python, and/or Qt. It is code level (API) compatible with mer. HTML5 apps intended for Android, Firefox OS, Ubuntu Touch, Windows Phone, and webOS will run without modification on Tizen. Galaxy Gear, Samsung Gear 2, Galaxy Gear Watch. Samsung Gear S, Samsung Gear S2, Samsung Connect Auto (this is cool, it plugs into OBD II diagnostic ports on cars and turns them into Linux powered smart cars), Samsung NX1, Samsung NX300M, NX200, NX300, Samsung Z1, Samsung Z3, Systena Tablet, devices use Tizen. Intel Tizen will run on IBM-PCs and it will run under Windows. Tizen is released under the Flora License which is essentially the BSD license plus "Tizen Certified" platforms are allowed to use Samsung's patents without restriction. This is essentially a support issue (Samsung blocking forks so they never have to provide support for them. They managed to top TiVo's efforts). This draconian solution means the Flora License is not OSI approved (and duh, their's no point in summiting the license for FSF approval). The licensing scheme is ultimately vague as cource code access is guaranteed by Samsung but any use outside "Tizen Certified" platforms is probably illegal (patent violation, not just a mere license violation which is not a violation of law) despite Samsung's encouraging devs to do exactly that. The Tizen SDK is free to use but proprietary (as Samsung holds all the copyrights, they could do this even if Tizen was GPL 1 or 2). Like everything else from Samsung, Apple sued. Apple also sued HTC and LG (for just thinking about Tizen apparently, since these companies are not making Tizen devices) But, Tizen is essentially Linux so Apple lost.

Bada (Post-2014), Cordova, PhoneGap, River Trail, and Sailfish OS are forks of Tizen.

MeeGo is unrelated to Tizen. Intel abandoned it in favor of Tizen and didn't take anything with them.

Atari 8-bit and Atari 5200 are far more alike than Coleco and ADAM. ADAM, for instance, has 3 additional processors. Also the processors common to both (CPU, GPU, SPU) can be used on ADAM in ways not possible on ColecoVision. Also, ADAM has 8 times more general use RAM and is upgradeable to 32 times more. The greatest difference, I think, is that ColecoVision development virtually ended when Coleco ceased support (until retrogaming); but ADAM development never stopped.

HTML5 has become a platform of its own, playable online or offline (download the .html and possibly other files, perhaps in a .zip) depending on the distribution method. Largely platform independent except for needing a browser or other piece of software capable of rendering HTML5 (likely also JavaScript and WebGL and few other parts optional to HTML itself, like Local Storage). This is even an export target in Unity and some other game making tools. For now I'll keep marking these as html5 and platform limitation since they're likely included in Internet Only platform which is misleading in some instances.

I regretted "Internet Only" very soon after suggesting it. A "browser" platform is a good idea. Games in the browser platform can be tagged with all applicable scripts/languages (HTML, Dynamic HTML, Coldfusion, HTML5, PHP, Java, Flash, Air, ActionScript, ruby). Noting, now, however, many of these can be used for a game packaged for a specific platform and function independently of a browser. So the game would have that entry as well. There are some borderline cases such as Google Native Client and similar platforms, which run native code (they actually not browser games, but are packaged to run via browsers). But I lean toward making these "browser" games as well (again, except in cases specific platform packaging).

Assuming we would rename it. Are there games amongst the currently 345 "Internet only" games that are not Browser based and have to be put under a different platform? From screenshots only its hard to say.

I recently came across a list of nearly 200 games that (nearly) all were published and intended to run on a total of 104 platforms (I actually truncated that list, it could be as high as 180 platforms). of 80 of these 104 platforms were supported _only_ because of the ability of these games and to run on CP/M and the ability of the platforms .

So, I would really like us editors to reach a concensus on what to do about about CP/M. Today, I'm leaning toward adding 66 platforms and entering C/PM games for each individual platform. But that's _a lot_ of entries if something else is decided about CP/M later.

I recently came across a list of nearly 200 games that (nearly) all were published and intended to run on a total of 104 platforms (I actually truncated that list, it could be as high as 180 platforms). of 80 of these 104 platforms were supported _only_ because of the ability of these games and to run on CP/M and the ability of the platforms .

So, I would really like us editors to reach a concensus on what to do about about CP/M. Today, I'm leaning toward adding 66 platforms and entering C/PM games for each individual platform. But that's _a lot_ of entries if something else is decided about CP/M later.

Lets be realistic. Adding those platforms is not an option. We should find a solution to group this kind of stuff. How do other gaming databases do this? Adding so many super-obscure platforms, better not. Would a general CP/M platform fit and write in the description which computers this encompasses?

Edit: Just saw you already suggested the CP/M platform in the title. So this is definitely the better way to try.

For the 66 new to UVL platforms? other gaming databases focus on a single platform. Other gaming databases that are multiplatform, don't have them at all. UVL would be the only multiplatform gaming database on the web to have them.
For CP/M? gaming databases for CP/M don't exist (as far as I can tell)

I feel I should note that these 66 platforms are all likely to have their own platform specific games outside of CP/M. And, as I have now discovered, there is CPU specific CP/M games, architecture specific CP/M games, and platform specific CP/M games. There are also CP/M games independent of one, two, or all three of these categories.

Yes, they are all unique. Some of them share the same concept (ie: falling blocks, mastermind, hangman) but each does it a in a unique way ('hangman math', 'hangman trivia', 'mastermind with words', etc...). However, my initial estimate was high. After scrutinising each game, some of them turned out to be more like activities. Others were 'projects', the beginnings of a game that the end user was encouraged to finish in their own way or incorporate into their own games. Leaving about 135, but on the same number of platforms.

A somewhat extensive update has been made to the Tandy Color Computer platform and related tags. But I suspect there are at least 500 more titles. Also, we are not yet near utopic completion for the titles already listed.

[size=+2]29 games[/size] so far
And this is odd, it has a CP/M emulator

The effort is lead by Alan Cox and was announced by Linus Torvalds. Apparently, while the kernel team was arranging discontinuation of their involvement in ELKS (embedded Linux kernel, focused on 8086 systems) Alen Cox launched the Fuzix project (influenced ELKS) as response to SystemD and specially Kdbus as the trigger. Kdbus was killed but Fuzix lives on. While there is a great deal of porting to classic 8-bit systems, Fuzix is actually extremely useful in that archaic (cheeper than dirt cheep) hardware can be put to real use in the modern world. Also those n-in-1 TV systems, for example, could be turned into full gaming consoles, internet terminals, steamboxish streaming recievers, etc.

I am currently working on games on the MS-DOS platform and what is still bugging me quite a bit are the double entries for several PCJr and Tandy1000 versions under the MS-DOS platform. I plan to merge these entries in those cases. The pcjr and tandy1000 tag will be added for games that have either a "special" PCJr, Tandy1000 version/mode or are exclusively released for PCJr/Tandy1000. Making a whole new platform for them is also not necessary in my eyes, because they belong into the IBM-PC compatible category and they belong into the same family as MS-DOS (or lets say DOSBox family).

Ferranti Mark 1
AKA: Manchester Electronic Computer
AKA: Manchester Ferranti
1951
This was a PC for sale to the public and people bought it. The University of Manchester bought the first unit ever manufactured. It was capable of music. It could fit in a _small_ room or large walk-in closet; basically it was built into a massive desk 12 cubic meters in volume. It beat the UNIVAC to market by 4 months. And, it had a games!

CheckersChess (by Dr. Dietrich Prinz)
Turochamp(Mate-in-two) (by David Champernowne and !Alan Turing!) Alan Turing was 'porting' a computer game to the Ferranti Mark 1 when he died. I say 'porting' because he initially wrote the game for a theoretical computer that existed only on paper and in mind. He would use a real chess board and the code on paper to play against humans by stepping through papered code (kinda like D&D with miniatures). Moves calculated by Turing using the program took at least 30 minutes. The Pilot ACE and a few other real computers were based on Turing's theoretical computer design. But the Ferranti Mark 1 was the first computer that Turing felt was capable of running Turochamp. Initially it failed to run on the Ferranti Mark 1 for lack of memory but he continued working on. After he died, David Champernowne finished Turing's port. This was however, a reduced port with such things as castling removed entirely from the algorithm. As it was reduced, this was not the Turing Engine. Turing was also porting Machiavelli, a rival chess program by Donald Michie and Shaun Wylie for the same theoretical computer design. The work on Machiavelli was never completed? In 2004 Mathias Feist was the first to fully code the Turing Engine on a computer. When he tried to reproduce the only game ever recorded of the "paper machine" against a human player, the engine deviated from the original game. Feist searched for the mistake he had made until a colleague of Turing suggested that the bug was not in the code and was instead in Alan Turing. It was eventually determined that Turing had tired (after the first 15 hours) and slipped up in some arithmetic or had even selected a different tree than the engine had. The Turing engine can be played without slip ups using Fritz. Kasparov says the engine makes "decent moves" and can beat amateurs. It in fact does.

I recently discovered that the IBM System/370 has more than one game for it
Zork (of course)
Monsters of Murdac
Avon
Star Trek (Ray Mullins has access to the source code)
Awit (Chess)
Bobby (Chess)
Bs6676 (Chess)
Duchess (Chess)
Fischer/Schneider (Chess)
Kaissa (Chess)
Merlin (Chess)
Proscha (Chess)
Samiel (Chess)
USC CP (Chess)
Xenarbor (Chess. OK, I gotta find out what the deal is that there's so many different Chess games for one ancient mainframe)
The non-chess ones are all interactive fiction games.
Also, the System/370 game list saw an exponential growth in 2000 when Scott Chapman ported GNU/Linux. Fully graphical games.
Minecraft was compiled for modern zSeries which are compatible with with System/370 (I have no way to test)

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